Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ilbranteloth" data-source="post: 7354332" data-attributes="member: 6778044">I guess this seems as good a place as any to jump in...First. I don't give a crap about "player agency." <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> Ok, I do, but not quite in the same idealistic way that a lot of gamers on the forum do. To me "player agency" (one of those buzzwords I hate since there isn't an agreed-upon definition), is simply that the players (primarily as their characters) get to make decisions in the game without interference or the rules changing under their feet.In a recent thread elsewhere, somebody cried foul against player agency because the DM preferred his players to roll their ability scores (as do I). This was taking away player agency, because they couldn't set their own ability scores.I disagree. How you generate ability scores is part of the rules of the game. And the DM (and to a degree the table) determines the rules of the game. To put it a different way, I have limited time to run a D&D game, and want to run the game in a way that I enjoy. I'm happy to put rules up for discussion, and will often change them if that's what the table wishes.But one of the most enjoyable part of character creation is the excitement of rolling six abilities (in order) and the inspiration they provide to help develop and design this character. And sure, it's easy to start with the highest score and build something from that, but it's usually the mix of them that starts to inspire something. This is what the character is "born" with, and then we take it from there. We generally roll characters together, and this process is often one of brainstorming amongst the group. We also often roll 3 characters at a time (and all 3 are built to the basic 1st-level character). The point is, that we've (I've) set a limitation of the game (or chosen one of the options given). But that's not harming the precious player agency. It's just providing a different framework for the player to fully and completely express their player agency. That framework is part of what defines the game, just like basing the ability scores on 72 points, or a range of 3d6 (instead of percentile), or whatever. Limitations in and of themselves are not an impact on player agency.So to so-called secret backstories:It doesn't matter if the DM thought of something 2 days ago, 2 hours ago, or 2 seconds ago. All have their benefits, and all can also be problematic. Personally, I'm not a fan of everything being defined and noted in every place on the map, etc. That's too much prep and doesn't provide much in return. However, I love things like a couple of sentences defining a few characteristics, goals, and such for an NPC, monster, or whatever. I love digging into the ecology of a creature (say, lizardfolk), and defining how they view the world as a race, how they interact with it, how they live. All too often, DMs and writers approach a monster only in relation to their encounters with adventures.For example, it is my fervent belief that drow, duergar, and other underdark races would light their cities and regularly frequented locations with dim light. Why? Because they are at a disadvantage in darkness. But the usual argument is that they are at an advantage against humans and surface races. But the day-to-day life, indeed, the year-to-year or even the decade-to-decade they may not come across a surface dweller that lacks darkvision. On the other hand they encounter lots of other deadly things in the Underdark, and would naturally ensure that they weren't at a disadvantage (darkness = disadvantage on Perception checks), and increase visibility to the nearest physical obstacle, instead of just 120 feet. To put it a different way, once you're within 120 feet of a Displacer Beast, it's probably too late...Anyway, this is "secret backstory." Or, it's world-building and intelligent DM prep so I have a sense as to what I'll have to describe when I need to improvise. So back to your specific questions, well question. I'm going to speak to #2. The gambling debts are indeed the dreaded "secret backstory." However, in addition to recommending intelligent prep (and in this case that magistrate might have 2 or 3 sentences at most), I also say that nothing is set in stone until it enters the campaign.For example, during the PC interaction, the players start looking for a potential way to convince the magistrate to divulge the secret location (oh, that's secret backstory too). In the process, they inquire about his family, in particular one of the players asks about a rogue that they had previously discovered to be a magistrate's son (I might have even forgotten). In the process it occurs to me that the magistrate's son is the one with the gambling debts, and he fears for his life, and is willing to give away the secret location for them to help his son.In other words, through the interaction with the players, a better scenario has presented itself, and my secret backstory bent to accommodate the circumstance. It rewards good play with results, without having to pre-plan everything, and more importantly, acknowledges the fact that it's a game where we're all visualizing something different in our heads, and without the benefit of actually being present with the person in question, etc. My input into the story is entirely that of the NPCs, monsters, and world itself, and is often "written" in response to things the players say, not just what the characters do and say. Sometimes things that came directly from the players don't materialize for a while. But I find that the more I listen to and incorporate what the players say, and the ideas they have (often just an offhand comment), the more it draws them into the game, because they can relate more directly to things they thought of, even if they don't remember it.Another example would be searching for a hidden tomb. In my campaign the players have found a map amongst the belongings of a deceased adventurer. There are some basic instructions to the location. I have an idea of where it will be located, and they have set a priority to find it. They didn't follow up (yet) on what I thought they might. But if there's anything I've learned, the players never do what I expect. But I provide lots of potential threads and hooks for them to follow, and they pick up the one they want to follow at a specific time. I don't have to have all of the answers about where this tomb is, or exactly how they'll find it, etc. And there are lots of threads they never follow up on. That's fine too. I also don't think there's inherently a problem with a single solution scenario. My players expect to encounter things from time-to-time that they can't overcome...yet. And it's actually a very good thing too. In my world, if there's a tomb that has survived mundane and magical attempts to plunder it for over 2,000 years, then it's going to be a pretty deadly challenge if the PCs figure out how to get in when nobody else has. And not being able to get in yet is probably saving them from certain death. Obviously it will be a challenge even for somebody that manages to figure it out. I don't generally design puzzles that the players must figure out exactly, although this group likes those sort of things. And it was part of what originally rounded out D&D into more than just combat. So failure here doesn't mean there aren't other options in life (usually), but it does help build a more believable world in that they won't always be successful.Perhaps it's just me and my own abilities, and that there are people that can run a game without any preconceived or prepared "secret" information. I find that having lots of little bits and pieces give me the tools to improvise better, as a starting point, when the players run off to do something unexpected. Like the session that started with the characters heading to a merchant caravan's camp to gather information on one of their priorities, only to be side-tracked when the  "I can't relate to people unless I've had something to drink" sorcerer lamented the fact that due to a recent magical mishap he is immune to the effects of alcohol for the next 20 days, and he really, really wanted anything to help and asked if maybe there were any drugs he could find. Suffice to say, that session didn't go near anything I expected, and had I been a "prep first" type DM wouldn't have used anything I prepped. Instead, I have 30+ years of notes, thoughts, little maps, rumors, plots, schemes, NPCs and monsters to draw from for inspiration and I can take all these bits and pieces of "secret backstory" as a launching pad to improvise but still maintain consistency in the world.The bottom line is there isn't anything wrong with pre-authored vs improvised. What matters is that the players are engaged, they feel like they are part of the world and the adventure, and that you aren't changing the rules, inhibiting their choices, or making arbitrary decisions that have significant impact on their play or their characters. To me it's more of a continuum, with preauthored at one end, and totally improvised at the other, with various branches regarding how much input the players have on the world and setting vs. the DM, etc.Some people prefer a much more collaborative approach, where the players provide direct and in-the-moment influence in the world and other aspects outside of the specific character. I'm not a fan of those myself. I've yet to find a group that can do that well, and that asks to do it more. On the other hand, I have lots of former players that either ask to rejoin, or if they've moved away, lament that they can't find a DM that they like as much, or that runs a game in the manner I do. It's clear when somebody joins my table that I'm setting limitations (I have a lot of house rules), and that the focus will be different than other games. And the primary focus of the player is their character(s) and the actions they take and decisions they make. I do give them quite a bit of leeway in determining how they fit into the world up to this point, and in interactions with people in the village they have a say in what sort of relationship they have with a person, if they know them, etc. But they also understand that there is a point where I will make those determinations, or inform them when something that they suggest isn't the case. It's still a collaborative approach, but I have more of a final say when dealing with the world and its inhabitants outside of the PCs.It doesn't take away any player agency. They know right up front what the rules are, and how I run my game. They have 100% agency to play their character, and their actions and decisions as that character. Player agency is defined, in part, within the framework of the game being played. And to say that running a D&D game where the DM preps material is taking away player agency when compared to another game (D&D or otherwise) where the DM improvises, or works only from random tables, etc., is like saying it's no fair that you can't jump the other player's pieces in chess. That's simply because chess is different from checkers. It's not affecting their agency at all. To fully address player agency and its relationship to things like secret backstory, or even somethings as controversial as fudging dice, requires you to take into account the specific rules in play at the table, and the goals of the DM and the players and what they are expecting to get out of it. I recently ran a very linear campaign (multiple parallel story arcs), where as the DM I "authored" a much larger part of the story than I normally do. But that's what that group wanted, it's the way they like to play, and to not provide that would have been taking away their player agency to play the type of game they preferred.</blockquote>

Verification